Ezekiel 30:24

30:24 I will strengthen the arms of the king of Babylon, and I will place my sword in his hand, but I will break the arms of Pharaoh, and he will groan like the fatally wounded before the king of Babylon. ¹ 

Ezekiel 5:16

5:16 I will shoot against them deadly, ²  destructive ³  arrows of famine, ⁴  which I will shoot to destroy you. ⁵  I will prolong a famine on you and will remove the bread supply. ⁶ 

Ezekiel 14:13

14:13 “Son of man, suppose a country sins against me by being unfaithful, and I stretch out my hand against it, cut off its bread supply, ⁷  cause famine to come on it, and kill both people and animals.

Ezekiel 30:22

30:22 Therefore this is what the sovereign Lord says: Look, ⁸  I am against ⁹  Pharaoh king of Egypt, and I will break his arms, the strong arm and the broken one, and I will make the sword drop from his hand.

¹ tn Heb “him”; the referent has been specified in the translation for clarity.

² tn The Hebrew word carries the basic idea of “bad, displeasing, injurious,” but when used of weapons has the nuance “deadly” (see Ps 144:10).

³ tn Heb “which are/were to destroy.”

⁴ tn The language of this verse may have been influenced by Deut 32:23.

⁵ tn Or “which were to destroy those whom I will send to destroy you” (cf. NASB).

⁶ tn Heb, “break the staff of bread.” The bread supply is compared to a staff that one uses for support. See 4:16, as well as the covenant curse in Lev 26:26.

³ tn Heb “break its staff of bread.”

⁴ tn The word h!nn@h indicates becoming aware of something and has been translated here as a verb.

⁵ tn Or “I challenge you.” The phrase “I am against you” may be a formula for challenging someone to combat or a duel. See D. I. Block, Ezekiel (NICOT), 1:201-2, and P. Humbert, “Die Herausforderungsformel ‘h!nn#n' ?l?K>,’” ZAW 45 (1933): 101-8.